"Alabama is fighting an invasive weed, 'the killer weed, the nearly indestructible weed,' cogongrass."

"The Tennessee Valley Authority said Monday that it would spend $43 million on economic development projects in Roane County, Tenn., the site of a huge coal ash spill at one of the authority’s power plants last December."

"The Gulf of Mexico opened to industrial-size fish farms Thursday after federal regulators declined to oppose the plan."

"They are not cute and cuddly, but the smalltooth sawfish is getting more federal protection in Southwest Florida waters."

"President Barack Obama is creating a new federal interagency task force to coordinate the "economic and environmental resiliency" of Louisiana and the rest of the Gulf Coast region."

Perry County, Alabama, which is very poor and almost 70 percent black, is landfilling the coal ash from a spill in Tennessee in December 2008. County leaders are glad of the revenue and jobs it will bring, but some think the community "has been too easily persuaded to take on a wealthier, whiter community’s problem."

Shallow rivate wells in part of West Palm Beach, drilled illegally by contractors, may be exposing homeowners there to drinking water contamination. People there fear a possible cancer cluster.

"The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has agreed to set limits on nutrient pollution blamed for turning Florida’s waters into algae-choked messes."

"COLUMBIA, S.C. -- State-owned utility Santee Cooper decided Monday to drop plans for a controversial coal-fired power plant in South Carolina, a move lauded by environmental groups that had criticized the facility."

"A limestone 'quarry alley' 45 miles west of downtown Louisville resembles the scarred landscapes of eastern Kentucky, flattened by blasting for coal. ... Limestone, it turns out, is the key ingredient for stripping sulfur dioxide from smokestacks, helping to reduce acid rain and asthma-inducing haze."

"The first hurricane of the Atlantic season loomed far out in the ocean Tuesday, gaining power and moving on a track that forecasters said could take it close to Bermuda by the end of the week."

"Federal regulators voted [Aug. 13] to impose tough new restrictions on the commercial longline fishing fleet in the Gulf of Mexico in an attempt to protect marine turtles."

One resident says the Little Pee Dee River is unsafe for swimming because of fecal coliform bacteria from hog farming.

"Man made levees line the banks of the Mississippi River and its tributaries. They protect towns and they allow farmers to plow the bottomlands. But levees come at a price: habitat destruction and worse flooding downstream. Now, more people are calling for taking down levees and returning floodplain areas to their natural state."

"Water managers and the White House signed a crucial contract Thursday that promises a much-needed infusion of federal dollars for the Everglades."